Publications

The Rock-Star Appeal of Modern Monetary Theory

By Atossa Araxia Abrahamian

The Nation, May 22–28, 2017. All Rights Reserved.

In early 2013, Congress entered a death struggle—or a debt struggle, if you will—over the future of the US economy. A spate of old tax cuts and spending programs were due to expire almost simultaneously, and Congress couldn’t agree on a budget, nor on how much the government could borrow to keep its engines running. Cue the predictable partisan chaos: House Republicans were staunchly opposed to raising the debt ceiling without corresponding cuts to spending, and Democrats, while plenty weary of running up debt, too, wouldn’t sign on to the Republicans’ proposed austerity....